On February 26th, 22 students departed for the 2015 Philadelphia Model United Nations (PhilMUN) Conference, hosted at the Wyndham Hotel in Old City, Philadelphia. The annual conference is run by the Institute of Domestic Affairs, a national organization sponsoring events for high school students. PhilMUN is run by students at Rutgers University, who spend months preparing for the conference.

The theme of this year’s PhilMUN was “The Middle East in Transition”. Haverford delegates represented two nations, Switzerland and Kazakhstan. After being assigned one of these two countries, students chose a UN committee to debate in during the conference. There were a variety of different committees, from the Commission on the Status of Women to the World Trade Organization.

The students remained at the conference from February 26th to March 1st. During this time, they debated various topics within their committees, with other nations present. The goal was to produce resolution papers on each topic, which proposed solutions that the nations writing them sponsored. This year’s conference was especially exciting: each committee experienced a “midnight crisis”. In this simulation, students were told about an emergency situation occurring in Yemen. Each committee had to quickly propose strategies to combat the crisis, depending on what their committee’s theme was.

Overall, the students enjoyed an educational and productive weekend in Old City. While making new friends, they were also able to explore what the “Middle East in Transition” truly means, and if facets of this transition can apply to their own lives.

Haverford’s Model UN sponsors are Ms. Borck Hadley and Ms. Chaga.